


The Choices change, The result does not.

by Legionnaire24601



Category: Trollhunters (Cartoon)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-20
Updated: 2018-06-20
Packaged: 2019-05-26 05:17:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14993615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Legionnaire24601/pseuds/Legionnaire24601
Summary: The last Pendragon fell to his knees and Morgana’s laughter cut through the sounds of battle like a knife.





	The Choices change, The result does not.

_ There is a price for magic. There is always a price. _

 

He'd seen it. Back when both He and the world was still young. Back when he had very little control or understanding of his powers. He would watch in impotent horror as Morgana and a horde of vicious creatures crawled from the deepest pits of the world. He’d Seen it through a thousand different lives, each one more horrible and violent than the next. Merlin saw what she was capable of. What she would do. Seen the nightmare play out in a hundred different ways with the same result. He refused to believe it.

Having known her, having come of age with her at his side, he tried to prevent it. He tried. Naive as he was back then, he believed that their friendship would be enough to get her to, at least, attempt to combat that slow growing darkness within her. He took it upon himself to show her how to properly wield her power in the effort to try to keep her within the light. But the more Morgana learned, the more that shadow within her grew. And Merlin didn’t realize that the corruption had taken ahold of her completely until it was too late.

 

_ The battle had gone on for hours. Arthur and the traitor Mordred where fighting along the banks of the Cam river. Blow for blow the ringing of steel cut through the air. Excalibur was ripped from The kings hand with Mordred’s powerful parry, before the villain kicked out at and knocked Arthur backwards into the ground. Screaming madly, The Dark knight launched himself forward in triumph. Staggering backward and panicking, Arthur grabbed the first thing he could find to defend himself and lunged forward. The Spear struck true, and impaled Mordred. The crazed knight shuddered in surprise, furious his eyes widening. The King visibly relaxed as he took a moment to savor his victory. It was in that instant, that split second when his guard was down that Mordred’s eyes flared an inhuman red and Merlin watched in horrified realization as the changeling roared and impaled himself further. King Arthur looked on in petrified shock. The monsters blade rose and went through steel plate and mail and sank, slowly, deeply into his friends middle. With a vicious twist Mordred removed the sword before collapsing. The last Pendragon fell to his knees and Morgana’s laughter cut through the sounds of battle like a knife. _

 

In the end She proved him right. In the end it just wasn't enough. It had never been enough. She had always wanted more. 

 

_ There are things that He will never forget, no matter how hard he tries. _

_ Morgana’s delighted laughter  ringing through his ears as he tried to stop the bleeding.The cracking of skulls, the snapping of bones as her monstrous creations swarmed Camelot’s Knights. The low moans of Arthur’s Men as they lay where they fell, wounded and dying. The warm, wet, crimson ichor that was slowly staining his hands red. The nauseating taste of copper drifting on the wind. The painful wheezing from his friend, his brother, writhing in agony in the cold slick muck, struggling against the firm press of Merlin’s shaking hands.  _

 

_ Excalibur lay next to the dying King. He knew what he had to do. Merlin had seen it often enough. She wasn’t focusing, she thought she had won. The hilt burned him, for he was not meant to wield it. Merlin gripped it tighter inspite of, or, because of the pain coursing through his hand and heart. One good swing, all his strength, rage and pain put behind it and The laughter quickly turned into a shocked gasp.  _

 

She manages to get away. 

Kneeling in the mud, next to the corpse of The king of Camelot, Merlin makes no attempt to control his precognition. He sees it all, and accepts it for what it is. He will  have to create something even more powerful than him. He will do it without question now, no protesting, no cliche attempt to redeem her. He’ll do it and in the process lose a bit of himself along the way. It’s fine. Their war was not yet over. He has to contain her somehow, he’d have to use all his power to do so. And when he does the world will once again be vulnerable to the darkness she unleashed. He holds her hand and sees what it will become,  but this… this amulet, it would choose those strong enough, capable enough to help the world in his absence.   
  


_ “Are you sure?” His apprentice asked worriedly, “We can find another way. This isn’t you.” _

_ “No it’s not, but I’ve gone too far to be anyone else.” _

_ With grim satisfaction, Merlin watched Morgana’s palm sink into the cauldron. Never again would she raise that hand against someone he cared about. Never again would it summon monsters to bring forth an eternal night. His apprentice looks at him with concern. Merlin ignores him and continues to wordlessly bind some of his magic to the contents of the cauldron. _

 

He’s not infallible. He knows how it looks. 

It’s easy to point fingers. It’s easy To say that He ruined the boys life. He admits that he would have prefered the Adult Jim timeline. A young man who had at least experienced some of life's possibilities before taking up the mantle.  But the boys choices, and the choices of those surrounding him, led him to take on the burden much earlier than he should have. In this, Merlin refuses to be blamed. His foresight is not perfect, not really, he does not always see the choices that lead up to the result. Nor does he care to, in the end, though the way things happen may change, The result always remains the same.

 

_ The cold wind whipped at his face as Merlin stood alone on the banks of the Cam river, watching the funeral boat drift lazily across the dark blue waters. The Mists of Avalon parted to embrace the once and future king, and then he was gone. Arthur was the sacrifice,The loss of his friend was the price for this creation.  _

_ For the champion of Trolls to rise,  a human life must be submerged.  _

 

Had Jim not made the choice to change, had he remained human, the loss would have been the same. The cooking, that he so loved? What would be the point if everyone he cooked for was gone? That school that he ran to for a sense of normalcy, it would have been destroyed. One cannot attend a building that isn’t there. As for enjoying the sun, well, with Morgana succeeding in establishing her Eternal Night, he never would have enjoyed it again anyway.

 

The choices change, but the result does not.


End file.
